"I've made bad choices. Bad decisions. I left home to try and get me fixed. But the truth is...I was just running away from all of the stuff I got wrong. So it's time for me to quit running. It's time to stop taking and start contributing. What I want...I want to be apart of something bigger than myself."
— Jace Fox
A DC Digital-First miniseries by Academy Award-winning writer John Ridley and artists Tony Akins and Travel Foreman. The Next Batman: Second Son dives into the mysterious origins of Timothy "Jace" Fox, the eldest son of Lucius Fox who rose to become Bruce Wayne's successor as the Batman prominently featured in DC Future State.
Set within the continuity of DC Infinite Frontier, the series kicks off with Jace Fox narrowly surviving a high-stakes mission gone sideways in the jungles of Vietnam. Having been estranged from his family after a grave mistake made when he was a teenager brought infamy to his name, Jace spent the years of his exile as a covert operative targeting various figures in the criminal underworld alongside his trusted guy in the chair named Vol. But after the duo's current target Tyler Arkadine, a billionaire philanthropist secretly running an international trafficking ring, successfully counters their attempt to infiltrate his Vietnamese compound, a battered and demoralized Jace has no choice but to return to his safehouse to plan his next move.
But a certain someone was waiting for Jace back at the safehouse. The masked mercenary Grifter had arrived on the behalf of Lucius to bring him back home. As it turns out, a lot has happened in the time Jace has been away from Gotham. And if the Fox Family was ever going to be whole again after enduring such a number of ordeals, they needed to bring Jace back into the fold. A decision that inadvertently sets into motion a series of events that will change Jace's life forever...
The series consists of 12 chapters, collected as 4 issues in print issues. Jace's story continues in I Am Batman.
The miniseries contains examples of:
- Asshole Victim: Deconstructed. We learn that Enrique Acevedo, the man that Jace killed, was a known domestic abuser, criminal and heavy drinker. Lucius uses a team of lawyers to leak this to the press and publicly smear Enrique's name and imply that he was drunk and the one at fault when Jace hit him, in order to help his son. It works, but Jace himself doesn't care about any of that — as far as he's concerned, he killed a man, and the man's character doesn't change that.
- Batman Cold Open: The first issue opens with Jace infiltrating Tyler Arkadine's heavily guarded compound in Vietnam to rip data from his hard drive that can be used to take down his trafficking ring. The sequence quickly establishes Jace as a Badass Normal who showcases much of the skills you can expect from somebody destined to wear the cowl.
- Big Brother Instinct: Despite their differences and mutual beef with one another, Jace and Luke have one thing they both agree on: Nobody messes with their sisters.
- After Tamara relapses into a coma due to the side effects of being forcibly overdosed on a derivative of the Venom steroid by Ratcatcher, Luke suits up as Batwing and tears Gotham's criminal element a new one to hunt down Ratcatcher and force him to synthesize a cure.
- And after finding out from Tiffany that a Paparazzi broke into Tam's hospital room to take pictures of her comatose body, Jace temporarily stops his hunt for Arkadine and orders Vol to dig up everything on the dude before jumping him in an alleyway and terrifying him into quitting his job.
- Big Damn Heroes: When Jace finds himself surrounded after getting stabbed in the side by O'Roark, an Old Friend of his shows up Just in Time to lend a hand.Katana: Good to see you, Jace-san. It's been awhile.
- Broken Pedestal: Luke Fox gradually becomes this to his little sister Tiffany, who's fed up with his unfair mistreatment of Jace ever since he returned home along with the fact that Luke admits he'd rather fight crime as Batwing than be around their family these days. Once Luke confesses he failed to secure a cure for Tamara's condition after Ratcatcher was killed during a GCPD raid, potentially dooming their sister to life in a comatose state, Tiffany becomes completely disillusioned with Luke.
- Cliffhanger: The mini-series ends with a grim one of these. While Tanya succeeds in getting the Acevedo family to sign an NDA to cease all legal action against Jace in exchange for a life-changing sum of money, Enrique's grieving son Edgar swears vengeance despite his mother's desire to just move on with their lives. Tiffany completely loses faith in her brother Luke and begins training to presumably become a crimefighter in her own right to make up for his failings as a superhero, all while Luke himself falls into depression over his failure to save Tam. And Lucius starts genuinely considering Simon Saint's proposal to support the Magistrate Program with his technology, bringing Gotham City one step closer towards becoming the Police State seen in DC Future State. But not all hope is lost, as Jace Fox discovers the trashed Bat-Armory under Wayne Enterprise and in it, a prototype Batsuit still intact...
- Contrasting Sequel Main Character: Jace Fox is this to Bruce Wayne much like fellow Bat-Successor Terry McGinnis was. Whereas Bruce comes from a respected and beloved Old Money family, Jace is the son of a self-made entrepreneur and inventor who is the subject of controversy over his Nouveau Riche status. Where Bruce is defined by the tragedy that befell him and his parents at the hands of a random mugger, Jace is a former delinquent who is haunted by an incident he himself caused during his youth which forced him into exile. Whereas Bruce's public persona is traditionally a Millionaire Playboy, Jace prefers to get by in life like a regular person and has an immense distaste for the Ultra-Rich and more specifically those who believe their wealth puts them above consequence. And where Bruce is incredibly stoic and grim under the cowl, Jace adopts a more sardonic persona during his vigilante endeavors.
- Dark Action Girl: Eabha O'Roark, a mercenary under Tyler Arkadine's employ, is the daughter of an infamous IRA veteran who was an expert in "vanishing" people during The Troubles and trained alongside the Cumann na mBan, a Irish Republican women's paramilitary organization. Not only does she have the eerie ability to consistently pinpoint exactly where Jace is despite him monitoring her from miles away, once they do finally come to blows, O'Roark near-effortlessly shanks Jace in between the ribs and would've finished the job if it wasn't for Tatsu's intervention.
- Dramatic Irony: Mayor Christopher Nakano seeks to make Renee Montoya into Gotham's next Police Commissioner due to her proven track record and the fact that she already earned the respect of the rest of the department. What he doesn't know is that Montoya was once The Question as well as a notable ally of the Bat-Family, which runs into direct conflict with the Anti-Vigilante policies that Nakano wants her to enforce once the laws are passed. While Montoya claims that she will indeed enforce the law, she also makes it very clear to Nakano that the people under her command won't be his personal assassins against Gotham's masked community.
- To a similar extent, Tanya Fox absolutely loathes superheroes and supervillains alike due to the numerous incidents where her family was dragged into the crossfire of their conflicts. What she doesn't know however is that her youngest son Luke is Batwing while her eldest son Jace is on the path to becoming the next Batman.
- Dysfunctional Family: In stark contrast to Bruce and by extension a majority of the Bat-Family who are either orphans or come from broken homes, there's a large focus on Jace attempting to mend the strained relationships with his biological family.
- His father Lucius is still distant and struggling to cope with the stress of inheriting the Wayne Family Fortune on top of the psychological trauma he's suffered as Punchline's captive.
- His mother Tanya sees him as a walking disappointment and has developed a severe disdain for costumed vigilantism as a whole, scapegoating them as the root cause of all of their family's personal struggles.
- His younger brother Luke despises his guts, utterly refusing to forgive Jace for any of his past sins. Luke also has been explicitly sinking more hours into his life as Batwing than usual to escape the drama back home.
- While his younger sisters Tamara and Tiffany try their best to keep the Fox family together, the former's compromised health declines to a point where she relapses into a coma while the latter's youth keeps her from being taken too seriously.
- Experienced Protagonist: Jace is already an accomplished field agent at the beginning of the story who is incredibly adept at stealth and can more than hold his own in a fight against multiple combatants. Chapter 11 reveals that he owes much of his prowess as a fighter to his training under Tatsu Yamashiro.
- The Faceless: Vol, Jace's equally enigmatic Mission Control and oldest friend, has yet to make any physical appearance and communicates almost exclusively through secured telecommunications. The only hints to their identity are that they first met Jace when they were both at "The Farm" and they're ethnically Russian. The story later clarifies that they're both Childhood Friends who attended the same Military School, but how that transitioned into the duo becoming involved in extralegal paramilitary operations is still a mystery.
- I Hate Past Me: Jace clearly harbors a lot of baggage from the consequences of his hedonistic past and a Noodle Incident he was involved in back when he was 17. It's gotten to a point where he's developed a significant Guilt Complex over it that's especially prominent whenever he's around his family. Even Vol can't help but throw a bit of shade every now and then at Jace's self-loathing streak.
- This plot point then takes a particularly darker turn in Chapter 10, it becomes clear that Jace's guilt has developed to a point where he has a genuine death wish; believing that it doesn't matter whether or not he dies trying to take down Arkadine, as his death would still be justice served in his eyes.
Jace: I'm doing this because I know what happens when people think they're above the law. And if I die trying...I suppose that's justice too. - Innocence Lost: Discussed. As a direct result of the trauma she endured as the hostage of Menace and Ratcatcher and seeing firsthand what they did to her sister Tamara, Tiff is no longer the naïve child she once was and is far more perceptive to the problems plaguing both her family and the city they call home.Tiff: I was there. I was forced to watch while they...while they poisoned Tam. While they brutalized her and dumped her body. And I know if they can't correct what they did, at the very least they need to pay for it.Luke: You're too young to be cynical.Tiff: I'm too old to be naïve. Actions have consequences.
- My Greatest Failure: During his legal deposition, Jace's testimony finally reveals the tragic mistake he made which has haunted the man for his entire life. During the events of his seventeenth birthday, Jace ran over a civilian crossing the street named Enrique Acevedo while driving back from a wild party. Critically injured from the collision, Enrique begged Jace for help while he bled out on the pavement. But the scared teen drove off in a panic, leaving Enrique to die in a pool of his own blood instead.
- To make matters worse, when a desperate Jace turned to Lucius for help after the hit and run, Lucius summoned his Army of Lawyers to dig up as much dirt on Enrique as humanly possible to leak to the media. Through their investigation, they ultimately discovered that Enrique was a notorious domestic abuser who was actually drunk and wandered onto the street at the time of the killing, enabling them to create a narrative that favors Jace enough so he can avoid jail. So not only is a man dead, but his name has been dragged through the mud so Jace could escape the consequences and scrutiny, further adding to the kid's Guilt Complex.
- No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: After an injured Batwing succeeds in preventing the GCPD from gunning down Ratcatcher's army of indoctrinated street urchins, Detective Whitaker ends up catching Luke limping in an alleyway and in no real condition to fight. Instead of apprehending him right then and there, Whitaker allows Luke to leave and pretends he never saw him. But this single act ends up putting Whitaker's entire law enforcement career in jeopardy as Commissioner Montoya not only knows he's lying, but is putting pressure on his partner Chubb to either bring him in line or report him.
- Older and Wiser: Tatsu Yamashiro was once a cold-blooded Crusading Widow who built her dreaded reputation by cutting down the Yakuza and other underworld figures associated with the murder of her family while bearing a cursed sword that steals souls. Here, it's shown that Tatsu has matured into a genuinely more merciful and heroic figure who took the younger Jace under her wing as a protégé during the years of his exile. Not only does Tatsu express commonality in Jace's plight as a killer seeking atonement, she actively encourages him to stop beating himself up and start using his talents to become a symbol of something better. She's even stopped dying her greying hair black so she could start looking her actual age for once.Katana: The person I am now regrets the person I was. But I'm so thankful for the person I've become.
- Prodigal Hero: Expanding off of what was set up in Batman (James Tynion IV), Jace is turning into a shining example of this trope.
- Snap Back: Renee Montoya's last major appearance before this series was a return to being the Question in Lois Lane after resigning from the GCPD, a move that was itself a Snap Back. Here, she's back to being a detective (and soon after, the Commissioner) with no reason given for her return.
- Those Two Guys: Future State's Chubb and Whitaker return as newly promoted GCPD Detectives under Commissioner Montoya and are always seen together commentating on Gotham's rapidly changing state of affairs. Whereas Chubb has no qualms about enforcing the new 'Anti-Mask' laws, seeing them as an inevitability once Mayor Nakano entered office, Whitaker believes that the good Batman has done over the years greatly outweighs the bad and that vilifying him and his allies are only going to cause more trouble than it's worth.
- Took a Level in Jerkass: Deconstructed. Lucius Fox, a long-time ally of Batman who has been generally portrayed as a Honest Corporate Executive and all-around Nice Guy, is showcased here to be significantly more hardened than initially believed. While Lucius is determined to uphold his responsibilities as CEO of Wayne Enterprises as well as its role in keeping Gotham City safe, he's also more than willing to cross whatever line he deems necessary for the sake of protecting his family. This development isn't unfounded however, as both Lucius and his family in storylines before this series have been routinely terrorized by the worst of Gotham's supervillains with Batman or one of his sidekicks only showing up to save the day after the damage has already been done. Thus making Lucius' more dubious behavior here a tragic case of a Surprisingly Realistic Outcome.
- To a lesser extent, his son Luke Fox has also become more notably abrasive in this series. But the brunt of his ire is laser-focused on one person in particular: Jace.
- Tyke-Bomb: Once Batwing finally locates Ratcatcher in Gotham's Underneath, the villain summons a small army of Street Urchins who all immediately jump to his defense. When Luke accuses Ratcatcher of brainwashing them just like his rodents, Otis quickly rebukes the accusation, revealing that all he did to secure their loyalty was to simply care of them when the system couldn't. Judging by one kid's absolutely heartbroken reaction to seeing Otis get gunned down by the GCPD's tactical response unit who raided their hideout during their brawl with Batwing, he clearly wasn't lying despite his sinister intentions for them as henchmen.Batwing: Instead of poisoning people, now you just brainwash kids and arm 'em up!Ratcatcher: They're not brainwashed. They're just how I found them. They're abandoned. Abused. Unloved. Gotham's one of the richest cities in the world and this is the best it can do with its neglected children. I don't have to brainwash them. Just give them food, shelter, put a gun in their hands, and tell them to be somebody. Know what's the best way to be somebody? Kill one of the Bats.
